Investment property from outside the USA?

[dakp2010]

Hi All,

im looking into purchasing an investment property in illinois and wanting some information on the best way to go about it from australia. I think it may be easier for me that other investors looking to buy as my wife is an American Citizen and has an American bank account. Am i correct? But im not sure where to go from here please help if you can.

Thanks David

 

[speedy gonzales]

Hi David,

Buying in the USA as a foreign national is simple & straightforward to do from Australia. Do you have a specific property in mind, are you wanting finance as a foreign national, are you buying through a "middleman" or company based in Australia selling US real estate ?

 

[dakp2010]

I was hoping to be able to get finance under my wifes name as she is a citizen so i would not have to go through all the foreign national paperwork. Wont be going through a middle man situation and we dont have a specific property in mind yet. Just wanting to know if it is actually possible before we get too far into it. Will the Banks, Loan writers etc accept our foreign income? Or will we have to do the foreign national finance option. What extra is involved in this? I know there are specific down payments that have to be made and higher interest rates. But what else? Thanks for your reply David.

 

[speedy gonzales]

David I would hazard a guess and think that both yourself & your wife would be treated as foreign nationals....unless your wife files US tax returns ?
Nothing much extra involved other then your choices get severely limited. Very little foreign national finance for investment properties except for a few states. I know of AZ, TX, FL.

 

[Drew Drew]

David, unless your wife's income is earned in the US, (thus also requiring a US tax return) then you will be considered foreign nationals. The reason is risk: without US based income & assets a lender really has nothing (other than the property) to pursue for collection in the event of default.

 

[owendale]

USA property

Hi everyone , my advice is simple basic and common sense ..having said that I have learnt the hard way by seeing other people profit from my ignorance . I too wanted USA property and in 2003 visited a company here in the UK that promised so very much! Even a free trip WOW. Hook line and sinker I fell for every little white lie. Today I sit here in the UK a fully licensed REALTOR with access to so much information I can see how much every third party so called USA property expert is making... And it makes me feel physically sick.... People from the UK eu and Australia are all jumping not the USA property gravy train... ALERT. BEWARE. Do not use them ... From experience I can fly over enjoy 2 weeks holiday looking at property and stay in a decent hotel .. Guess what I actually save money !!! And get a free holiday... Finding out all the details about any investment myself in person ... So what's stopping anyone else doing the same...??? And putting those third party greedy leeches out of business, that have never even been to the neighbourhood in which they sell property.
Come on decent people do something for yourself , I can help for FREE just ask and I will talk...
Best regards fellow investors and lets jump on the plane together and share a car...

 

[rrwolfpack]

Hi everyone, my name is Marc and I am new to this forum. This is an interesting topic as many people overseas are looking at properties of all shapes and sizes to invest in the US.

What kind of a property are you looking in Illinois? Are you looking near Chicago?

 

[speedy gonzales]

Hi everyone , my advice is simple basic and common sense ..having said that I have learnt the hard way by seeing other people profit from my ignorance . I too wanted USA property and in 2003 visited a company here in the UK that promised so very much! Even a free trip WOW. Hook line and sinker I fell for every little white lie. Today I sit here in the UK a fully licensed REALTOR with access to so much information I can see how much every third party so called USA property expert is making... And it makes me feel physically sick.... People from the UK eu and Australia are all jumping not the USA property gravy train... ALERT. BEWARE. Do not use them ... From experience I can fly over enjoy 2 weeks holiday looking at property and stay in a decent hotel .. Guess what I actually save money !!! And get a free holiday... Finding out all the details about any investment myself in person ... So what's stopping anyone else doing the same...??? And putting those third party greedy leeches out of business, that have never even been to the neighbourhood in which they sell property.
Come on decent people do something for yourself , I can help for FREE just ask and I will talk...
Best regards fellow investors and lets jump on the plane together and share a car...

owendale.

First of all :five::five::five:
I agree from an Australian's point of view. Every man & his horse has all of a sudden become experts on US property investing. They all have this big secret and if you pay them a membership fee or buy property through them they will let you in on the act. So first of all you pay them for some information that is available freely on the internet....then they refer you to one of their trusted allies on the ground in the US who they collect a commission from. If you went direct to the source in the US you save yourself a bundle. The salesperson probably can't even point to the city on a map and has never even seen the area they are selling in. I know a lot of this has been happening in the UK as well and quite a few investors thought they were buying cashflow homes in Detroit ended up with trashflow homes in a warzone.
Free trips to the US should be a sign people are making too much commission on sale and your the dumb sucker paying for it in the price anyway.
So your a licensed realtor in the UK or a licensed realtor in the US ?

 

[p_wht_12]

Hi everyone , my advice is simple basic and common sense ..having said that I have learnt the hard way by seeing other people profit from my ignorance . I too wanted USA property and in 2003 visited a company here in the UK that promised so very much! Even a free trip WOW. Hook line and sinker I fell for every little white lie. Today I sit here in the UK a fully licensed REALTOR with access to so much information I can see how much every third party so called USA property expert is making... And it makes me feel physically sick.... People from the UK eu and Australia are all jumping not the USA property gravy train... ALERT. BEWARE. Do not use them ... From experience I can fly over enjoy 2 weeks holiday looking at property and stay in a decent hotel .. Guess what I actually save money !!! And get a free holiday... Finding out all the details about any investment myself in person ... So what's stopping anyone else doing the same...??? And putting those third party greedy leeches out of business, that have never even been to the neighbourhood in which they sell property.
Come on decent people do something for yourself , I can help for FREE just ask and I will talk...
Best regards fellow investors and lets jump on the plane together and share a car...

I'm sorry for what happened to you but I guess there are really times that we have to learn things on our own.

To the original poster, there's nothing wrong with investing outside the country yo u are in now. You just have to look for someone who can manage the whole process for you like a trusted investment agent or a lawyer to close the deal. Goodluck on your future endeavor.

 

[rrwolfpack]

Thanks for chiming in, definitely learning a lot from a different point of view. With all of the new regulations being passed hopefully in the next couple of weeks who knows how much more money from outside borders will pour into US real estate. It will be an interesting development after decisions are made that's for sure.

 

[kruegs]

I looked at some of the 'middlemen' focussed on Australian investors, and while I think there may be some offering a decent service, they were not fully delivering on their promises of 'well priced property', arraning bank accounts or finance.

In the end I ended up identifying an area that I wanted to invest, found a responsive and helpful real estate agent to help identify the right property, a good building inspector, a helpful rep at the titles office and an agent to help form an LLC / EIN and provide a registered office. Yes, a bit to piece together but I am finding the process fairly straightforward and feel confident I am dealing with trustworthy people and getting fair value for money.

I suspect that many of these middle-men are actually making their money from the house-flip process, not from providing you a service... they buy a house in default, give it a lick of paint and turn it over to the captive audience of Aussies and Brits. If you go that path, just do as much due diligence as you can to ensure that the core purchase price of the property is still value for money and what you actually want. I would still always try and find an independent building inspector to review the property as a minimum and ensure that there is the ability to opt-out if the inspection yielded problems or a property that was not as good as described.

Good luck, the actual 'process' of purchasing property in the USA is quite a bit more straightforward than Australia. You just need to find the right people in the area where you want to invest to assist in piecing it together.


Regards,
Kruegs

 

[sunny_UK]

Hi owendale,

I am from the UK and want to start investing in buying and renting out property and sitting on the property until i retire which is approx 30 years...or so. I'm doing this now as i want to reite on this as part of my pension. I wish to seek advice and help on what i need to be looking for.

What is a good area to start off with? i'm looking to buy my first property no more than $60k with 30%-35% deposit and yes i can show 12 months of reserves for mortgage payments and taxes.

Thank you for your time!!

Regards,

Sunny

 

[Billy_]

Hi, David! I can say that purchasing your property without even seeing it is not a good deal. You can have so many problems with it. No investor will find exactly what you want. So you’d better find something that you like (at least 4 or 5 variants) and come to Illinois to make sure everything is ok with the documents and with the property. You can’t even imagine how many people regret of purchasing without even seeing what they are buying. Your real estate agent won’t tell you all the truth. To my mind, you’d better do it yourself.

 

[reyjohnson]

Certain countries are more open to foreign real estate investment, so it is preferable to consider investing in those areas first. It is important that investors take time to research the country and the potential investment properties prior to making the decision to invest.

 

[dcmhomebuyers112]

One factor that leads people to consider buying property far from home is that property may be more affordable in another state. Perhaps you live in an area like San Francisco or New York City, where property costs are sky high. If you simply can't afford to buy a place where you live or if doing so would require investing the majority of your money in real estate and you'd rather diversify your investments, you may want to look at other cities.